In the early decades of the twentieth century Jerome Myers was one of the leading progressive forces in American art. He sought opportunities for modern American artists to showcase their work and he was involved in planning the 1913 Armory Show in New York, which helped introduce Modernism to the United States.

Myers lived and worked in New York City’s Lower East Side, painting scenes of everyday life in streets near tenement houses. The Street Shrine depicts a Catholic procession in the Italian quarter of the city, possibly celebrating a saint’s day.